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Illithids
Illithids, commonly known as mind flayers, are a race of time traveling aberrations whose primary role in Eon is collecting taxes. And political revolution. Their favored class is wizard. While Eon illithids are mostly similar to the standard D&D enemy, they have some significant differences from the original, and have played a role in Eon's history. And by "played a role", we mean "vast illithid conspiracy claims to have set up everything." Or maybe it's two vast illithid conspiracies working against each other. Who knows, really. Illithids are essential to maintaining the Prime Material Plane as the only race that can spawn a competent caster of Snowstorm Prime. As spawning a caster kills that Mother, they are also the limiting factor on how many Ages may exist. __TOC__ Appearance Illithids are sexless, human-shaped creatures with enlarged heads, large eyes, and four tentacles in front of their mouths. They have three fingers and a thumb on each hand, though at least one has more. They have dark purple skin and red eyes. Abilities Illithids are a hyperintelligent, innately psionic race with a variety of magical abilities and a very high spell resistance. They are all planeswalkers capable of interplanar travel at will, though this ability is curtailed in that it only transports the illithid and those with whom they hold hands, but not their equipment or clothing. Their senses are better than those of most humans, with the exception of a nonexistent sense of smell. They have darkvision. Some are sensitive to light, but not all. Their physical and mental abilities tend to be superior to those of humans. Because their bodies were first used by their host for some years (and possibly because of the traumatic nature of the transformation) their lifespans are very short compared to those of other creatures, at about forty years. Their tentacles, if all attached to the skull of a victim, allow the illithid to extract and consume the victim's brain, killing them instantly. The illithid then learns a portion of the memories of their prey. It is possible to place a memory into an otherwise empty brain using a spell such as Modify Memory, which will then be heard by an illithid who eats that brain. The more intelligent the victim was, the better the brain tastes. Eating someone with Sanity Points would be extremely harmful to an illithid, though how exactly is not known. (Given the memory retrieval mechanism, it is possible that some of the Sanity Points might transfer to the eater.) Illithids do not have to eat brains to survive, as they can eat other food (even vegan food) for sustenance, but they generally prefer brains, especially those of highly intelligent, sane victims. "Mind flayer" is thus a misnomer, as illithids do not flay minds, they just read, control, and sometimes eat them. Illithids can also create slaves, called thralls, by dominating a victim so completely that their sentience is entirely suppressed. That victim is then given a permanent psychic link to their master, who is able to command them telepathically without fear of resistance. High-ranking illithids have such slaves for personal use. Culture The culture of illithids is one of extreme pride; young illithids spend large amounts of time between resonance stones which teach them what emotions feel like, and they are first exposed to arrogance. In general they do not apologize or admit fault. They are raised to believe themselves to be the supreme race of the planet, and that all others are inferior. They tend to be schemers, plotting to control their enemies. They also tend to be rather full of themselves. They share a racial philosophy of "let the strong destroy the weak, and by the way we are the strong and you are the weak", though sometimes this is compromised given their political standing. They are always plotting and fighting within themselves, but whenever anything threatens the community as a whole, they band together under the leadership of the Mother Brain to fight the threat. Illithids do not generally distinguish race (beyond "is it an illithid y/n") or gender, and tend to refer to humanoids as "thralls". This is extremely offensive to humanoids. Similarly, referring to illithids as "mind flayers" is highly offensive to them. Eating another illithid's brain is taboo in illithid society. Alhoons (illithid liches) are rejected from illithid society because in making themselves effectively immortal as undead, they have rejected the Mother Brain. Illithids are genderless and asexual as well as physically sexless, and having a gender identity and/or a sex drive are considered disgusting by the majority of illithids. Illithids who take class levels are generally encouraged to become sorcerers rather than wizards, despite their great intellect. This is to discourage them from becoming too absorbed in things outside the Mother Brain. They rarely study academic subjects in a formal setting, instead relying on the information the Mother Brain provides. Their short lifespans mean that they rarely have an interest in subjects such as history, with a few exceptions. For the same reason, they tend to prefer architecture and design to crafting objects, which takes many years to master. However, there are always a few who take up unlikely interests. Illithids' racial languages are Illithid, Common, and Undercommon. Illithid is a completely gender-neutral language with two formality levels: highly respectful and disdainful. The first is used for the Mother Brain, gods, and beings of great intelligence; the second is used for all others. Both versions of the language sound extremely formal, but the one for the Mother Brain is not ironic. Illithid is not a secret language any more, but it requires a very strong intellect to speak it; many non-illithids dabble, but few become fluent. With the exception of the "Mother" title for the Elder Brain, illithids use names instead of kinship titles, though they can all generally be considered siblings. The Mother Brain does not usually refer to her offspring as her "children", either, except for that one time so far. Reproduction Only the Mother Brains can reproduce; individual illithids' role in the continuation of their species is limited to procuring thrall hosts. The Mother Brain spawns large numbers of larvae, many of which are consumed by their siblings or their mother. The survivors are implanted in the brain of a humanoid thrall, where they consume and replace the brainstem in addition to physically transforming the body of the host in a process called ceremorphosis. No notable trace of the thrall remains after this process, which generally forms the first memory of the new illithid. They are able to speak, walk, feed themselves, and take basic care of themselves immediately after ceremorphosis, but do not know how or what to think about the world and rely on emotions to guide them. Generally illithids are made from a few standard humanoid races including humans, drow, elves, and dwarves. Attempts are sometimes made to ceremorphize other creatures; this does not tend to work. They still try it sometimes FOR SCIENCE. Young illithids spend most of their time between resonance stones, learning how emotions work and having large amounts of information directly downloaded into their brains from the Mother Brain. They learn to extract brains by practicing on livestock. At least some are also be taught to fight and solve puzzles. Some illithids sneak away as children, usually to explore libraries or seek education. At least one went off to run around adventuring, instead. As the Mother Brain can read any illithid's thoughts and assert control over them, she is giving her tacit approval of these actions, though the runaways are still punished upon return. The illithid age of majority is twenty. By this point most illithids have the majority of their psionic abilities. Northern Continent Illithids are usually a legal species in northern Eon, often the only aberrant race to be so, though many cities require them to have special registration. Pre-revolutionary Baldur had a significant illithid population and put them to work as tax collectors; Malvont was working towards the same model before the mass disappearances. Illithids are not allowed to become citizens in Goneril, but will not be killed on sight. Goneril does not permit the creation of thralls, however. Illithids live in small cities, each beneath a major surface metropolis. Known Northern Continent illithid cities are below Baldur and Malvont; the one below Malvont was significantly smaller. The illithids' social contract with humanoid cities generally restricts the creation of thralls to slaves (in Malvont) and/or prisoners (in Baldur), thus limiting the size of illithid communities. Due to their intimidating appearance and mind-reading abilities, illithids generally work as tax collectors in surface cities. They generally live under severe but understandable restrictions in humanoid society: in pre-revolutionary Baldur, for example, they were not allowed to eat brains or use their mind blasts and other mind-affecting abilities. In Malvont, mind blasts were allowed, but not the rest. Both major communities on the Northern Continent agreed to take only the thralls allowed them by the humanoids, thus severely limiting their population growth. Illithid adventurers are rare. Southern Continent Southern continent illithids are overtly hostile towards other races. They do not live with humans; the only interactions they have are raids on the surrounding area and being raided in return by Nyasan forces. They are not a legal species in Nyasa. The only known illithid city on the Southern Continent is Mind's Touch, and it is unclear whether or not the population of Mind's Touch left when the Northern Continent illithids disappeared. There is also rumored to be a Mother Brain in the Great Nyasan Valley, though the size and nature of any associated illithid city is unknown. The Mother Brain :See main article: The Mother Brain The Mother Brain, also known as the Elder Brain, looks unsurprisingly like an enormous brain which floats in a tank of liquid. She feeds on brains as illithids do, and is generally tended by several attendants. Illithids themselves are generally not religious (praying is a bit too much like saying "please") but tend to have a great reverence for the Mother Brains (all hail the Mother Brain). An illithid's greatest wish is to be reunited with the Mother Brain on death, which is done by bringing the dead illithid's brain to the Mother Brain and allowing her to absorb it. The Mother Brain is the source of all illithids in that city (except the ones who may have migrated from another city, where they came from that Mother Brain.) Therefore, many of the illithids in the world can be considered brothers. Due to the strange time-loop origin of illithids, there is no known way to make or spawn a Mother Brain, and no one knows how they came to exist in the first place. One Mother Brain dies in every casting of Snowstorm Prime. During the Revolution of 1441, all living Mothers were exiled to the Far Lands for safekeeping before the snowstorm. The moribund Mother of Mind's Touch remained behind to greet Ashra and give him instructions; she was then killed in Isona Vandr's assault on the city. Xenteroth attempted to contact the Mothers in the Far Lands and only heard the Mother Brain of Baldur screaming for help; she was unable to hear him. All living Mothers are currently in the Far Lands awaiting the Snowstorm. Emotion Stones Emotion stones are a type of object with uses ranging from defense to amusement. An emotion stone looks roughly like a normal rock, and can be any size from that of a baseball to a boulder. Anyone approaching the stone makes a Will save (unless they waive it) or else is overcome with the designated emotion. Since the stones are meant to function on illithids, the Will saves are often very difficult. The owner is generally immune, and can turn the stone's effect on and off at will. Destroying a stone sends a powerful wave of that emotion out for a surprisingly long range, and can have a permanent effect on the minds of anyone too close to the blast. Stone will block the effects of an emotion stone. Young illithids use emotion stones to discover what different emotions feel like, generally positive ones. Their first and most enduring exposure is to arrogance, which explains a lot really. Adult illithids sometimes use them as toys, or to manipulate others. Emotion stones are used architecturally in illithid cities with set patterns for which should be where, allowing illithids who are unfamiliar with the city's layout to feel their way around by the different emotions. They are also frequently used for defense; the illithid community below Baldur, for example, surrounded their city with a fifteen-foot gap of air on all sides and placed a despair stone below the city where its effect would spread through the air pocket. The intent of this is that anyone attempting to tunnel into the city would then be overwhelmed with despair and fling themselves into the pit. The Company evaded these defenses by use of Wall of Stone to make a tunnel. A similar trap was in the Ruins of Eldergrin. Tapestries in The Nautilus depicting the fall of Xenteroth included one which showed an illithid being struck down by a paladin in front of an emotion stone; the party does not know what type was depicted. The party has encountered emotion stones of arrogance, despair, joy, friendship, paranoia, frustration, love, hatred, and patriotism. A special type of emotion stone emulates the feeling of connection to a particular Mother Brain. These are made for each caster of Snowstorm Prime, to allow them to remain sane after their own Mother has died. They must be primed in warm water, and fuse with the palm of the caster's left hand. Their effect can be felt by other illithids of the same dead Mother, if any survive. Ulitharids Ulitharids are super mind flayers. They are created when an exceptional thrall with superhuman abilities is used as a basis for ceremorphosis. They are larger than normal, have longer tentacles (and more of them -- yes, two sets of tentacles, so divine), and even more psionic abilities. Their lifespan is no longer than normal, however. They are extremely rare. There is a cultural expectation that normal illithids will revere ulitharids, and they are even more arrogant than their lesser brothers. The party has never seen one in the flesh, but Analepsis and Prolepsis manifested as ulitharids to Ashra, since they are the ideal of her race. Casters of Snowstorm Prime are chosen from tadpoles that might have been ulitharids, "with the same probability of a normal tadpole becoming a ulitharid" (according to the Mother of Mind's Touch.) Voidmind A Voidmind is a creature that has been modified, with most of its brain replaced with a sort of jelly substance. It is then controlled by its owners, and is more powerful than the base creature was. Unlike a thrall, it retains its intelligence. The party has never met one, and creation of any new voidminds is highly unlikely because the process requires three illithids, and as far as we know there aren't three illithids on the Prime Material Plane who can stand to be in the same room. Thralls :See main article: Thralls Thralls are mind-controlled slaves. High-ranking illithids have them for fighting, labor, and random tasks. Thralls are also used as hosts for new illithids, as described above. Being given to the illithids to be thralled was a form of death sentence in Baldur, while Malvont allowed illithids to thrall legal slaves. Controlling the flow of thralls to the Northern Continent cities was one of the main ways for humanoids to keep control over the illithid communities. In the Southern Continent, they probably just grab people and carry them off. Thralls make illithids more vulnerable in that the domination effect can be suppressed or severed by antimagic and spells such as Break Enchantment. This is not usually an issue because most illithids do not adventure, but some people can be real assholes with antimagic spheres. History Talos cast the Snowstorm which transitioned between Primordial Chaos and the First Age; Xenteroth orchestrated the transition between the First and Second, writing the illithid history we now know. They exist in a stable time loop; at the end of the world (or a'' world; they may have come from another universe) illithids and their Mother Brain timeshifted en masse to the this world and settled in. In this Age's history, they appeared in about 1340 SA, an event which is rumored to be connected to Xenteroth's Tower. For this reason, no one knows the origin of the first illithids and Mother Brain, and there may not be one. Barron Ganth has described them as extraplanar beings. The Baldur illithids settled in below Baldur and spent about 40 years preying on the citizens of Baldur before being threatened with annihilation if they didn't play nice. They gained a guildhome and became a legal species, accepting political prisoners as thralls. For some time they supplemented this with large numbers of drow abducted from the nearby drow communities until Lady Elan emancipated the drow, cutting down on their population source. Baldur illithids traditionally sided with the Popularii despite the "let the strong destroy the weak" philosophy of their culture because they were a weaker civilization given the heavy restrictions on their numbers. By the Baldur Constitution they were entitled to a seat on the Ruling Council, but they were never allowed to send anyone. Malvont illithids were also a secret community, but remained hidden for far longer before eventually trying to make peace and entering a trial period to see if they could integrate with the rest of Malvont's society. They began to serve as tax collectors, similar to Baldur, and some Baldur tax collectors were sent over to help with the transition. Then everyone disappeared, so their integration into society was never finished or formalized. The illithids of Mind's Touch have had their city destroyed three times by Nyasan forces, but have always regrouped and refounded the city. A location for Mind's Touch is credited as an ''aboleth city in a hollowed-out mountain; it is unclear how this relates to the illithid Mind's Touch, but speculation is that the aboleth city was deserted and taken over by illithids on their arrival. While at the Vargus School, Grax received a letter from Chairman Xoth telling him that he was one of five illithids who might become High Regent Xenteroth, and that he had been chosen to take place in the Mothers' experiment. As of the finale of Season 1, the entire illithid race and their Mother Brains, with the known exceptions of Ashra, Chairman Grax, and Xoth, have plane shifted away from the Prime Material Plane. This was a semi-unwilling exile to the Far Lands (no one really likes it there) and is in preparation for the Snowstorm. Mind's Touch remained on the Prime and gave shelter to some illithid refugees from Baldur as well as her children. She was killed in an attack by Isona Vandr; the only known illithid survivors were Ashra, Venebrax, and five young psions from Baldur. Notable Illithids Team Giant Robot Army *Supreme Dictator Grax of Baldur *Xoth, one of Grax's top lieutenants *High Regent Xenteroth, technically an ascendent alhoon Team I Have A Lantern Let Me Show You It *Ashra the Puzzlesolver, CEO of Bona Fortuna, Inc. and the Chosen One, about to be technically a barren motherbrain *High Regent Xenteroth, technically an ascendent alhoon and yes he gets to show up twice *Venebrax, survivor of Mind's Touch and sword/forge bamf* *Five low-level psions from Baldur, names unknown, one of whom knows Metaconcert but has mysteriously forgotten how to manifest it Unknown *An illithid who no one recognizes (an illusion, but may have represented a real illithid) *An illithid whose face was concealed from view (an illusion, but may have represented a real illithid *Whoever was disguised as Evil Baudin during Season Seven (may be one of the other known illithids) Lost to Time *Talos, technically an ascendent alhoon *bad ass mind flayer Category:Species